ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE was brought
to attention in 1906 by a German neurologist Alois Alzheimer, who
discovered some curious microscopic changes in the brain of a deceased
demented patient.
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"Dear
Mr. Spelling, I forgot to do my homework again because I'm suffering
from Alzheimer's".
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No one knows what causes this
illness but what we do know today is that it mainly affects persons
over 60 years old and leads to microscopic scarring
of their brains and loss of brain weight. This accelerated
loss of brain cells is like losing chips in your computer. It leads
to poor function of brain dependent activities as less computing power
is available to the brain.
The person with Alzheimer's has problems with
memory, deep thought, movement, logic,
writing, and/or knowing where and who s/he is to different
degrees - with worsening as time goes on.
One major advance in treating Alzheimer's is finding from studies
that the brains of these patients produce less than normal amounts
of a chemical called acetylcholine. Current therapy therefore
involves artificially raising the level of this chemical by drugs.
Alzheimer's is diagnosed clinically by noting a progressive deterioration
in mental function after 60 and scoring poorly on a test called the
Mental Status Examination - a test comprising of a battery
of questions and skills the person in question could have answered
before.
Life expectancy after diagnosis is 10 to twenty years.
